Q: "Crossword" needs another definition in the OED?

[Joel S. Berson]

Dan's comment will require further research, but it suggests that the
OED needs to add another definition for the word "cross-word".

As Dan says, St. Nicholas magazine uses the word "cross-word" to
refer to clues in puzzles.  I think those puzzles were then (and
probably still are) called "acrostics".  (For such puzzles, the OED
has under "acrostic" an 1861 quotation.)  But St. Nicholas does not,
I think, refer to filling-in-the-grid puzzles.

The OED has for "cross-word" only the meaning "crossword puzzle"; it
seems to need another for "clues used in acrostic (or other types of
word) puzzles".  Perhaps this is limited to the hyphenated form.

Joel

At 2/7/2013 11:08 AM, Dan Goncharoff wrote:
>The term "cross-word" was used in the St. Nicholas children's magazine to
>refer to the clues in various forms of word puzzle well before 1913. They
>may not have involved filling in squares, but the "puzzles" did depend on
>clues called "cross-words" for the words, as well as placement.
>
>St. Nicholas is available in GB.
>
>DanG
>
>
>On Thu, Feb 7, 2013 at 10:23 AM, Joel S. Berson <Berson at att.net> wrote:
>
> > ---------------------- Information from the mail header
> > -----------------------
> > Sender:       American Dialect Society <ADS-L at LISTSERV.UGA.EDU>
> > Poster:       "Joel S. Berson" <Berson at ATT.NET>
> > Subject:      Re: Antedating of "Crossword" (Courtesy of Mr. Will Shortz)
> >
> >
> -------------------------------------------------------------------------------
> >
> > 1)  Mr. Will Shortz is, of course, the cross-word-puzzle editor of
> > the New York Times.  (To forestall Larry, not the cross word-puzzle
> > editor.)
> >
> > 2)   Mr. Shortz wrote his "college thesis" on early American word puzzles.
> >
> > 3)   Surely we need look no further back than 1913 Dec. 21, since the
> > fourth weekly puzzle appeared on Jan. 11, 1914.  And FUN was clearly
> > searching for the right word to coin.  (That is, I infer that no-one
> > else had used the word "cross-word" previously.)
> >
> > But might we find "cross-word" (literally) one week earlier in the so
> > far unrevealed Dec. 28 issue?
> >
> > 4)  Was the 19th-century "cross word puzzle" an acrostic puzzle?  I
> > note from a quotation in the OED that by 1928 both terms were in use,
> > apparently to distinguish them from each other:
> > 1928   Syracuse (N.Y.) Herald 19 Mar. 20/5   Cross word puzzles,
> > acrostics and word ladders are the fads of the day.
> >
> > Joel
> >
> > At 2/7/2013 06:30 AM, Shapiro, Fred wrote:
> > >The following information was graciously supplied to me by Mr. Will
> > Shortz:
> > >
> > >crossword (OED Dec. 1914)
> > >
> > >[1913 _New York World_ 21 Dec. (Fun section) 14  FUN'S Word-Cross Puzzle.]
> > >[1914 _New York World_ 4 Jan. (Fun section) 8  Find the Missing Cross
> > Words.]
> > >1914 _New York World_ 11 Jan. (Fun section) 12  Fun's Cross-Word
> > >Puzzle. ... The fourth in Fun's series of new cross word puzzles is
> > >given herewith.
> > >
> > >NOTE:  In addition to the information supplied by Will Shortz, it
> > >should be noted that the term "cross word puzzle" was used in the
> > >19th century for a different kind of puzzle, not involving squares
> > >to be filled in.  The earliest I find this in some quick research is
> > >in _Merry's Museum for Boys and Girls_, Sept. 1871, page 145
> > >(American Periodical Series).
> > >
> > >Fred Shapiro
> > >Editor
> > >YALE BOOK OF QUOTATIONS (Yale University Press)
> > >
> > >------------------------------------------------------------
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> >
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> >
>
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